Friday, June 30, 2006

"Oreos"

Calling blacks "Oreos" (brown on the outside, white on the inside) is undoubtedly a racial epithet and it seems to be at least as offensive to the the blacks concerned as the N-word. So how come that Leftists who would roundly condemn one offensive racial epithet (the N-word) seem to feel quite free about using another offensive racial epithet (Oreo)?

The following is from an article linked to on the webssite of black Congresswoman (and assaulter of police) Cynthia McKinney

"An Oreo black candidate named Denise Majette emerged as lots of money poured from the coffers of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) funded not only a hate campaign against McKinney, but in support of her opponent as well. Illegally, thousands of Republican voters crossed over to vote for the Oreo in the primary while the seat stayed safely Democratic, and all were quietly relieved when Cynthia didn't even make it to the general election."

There seems to have been a falling out between some Hispanic lawmakers in Florida. Rep. Gus Barreiro has accused Rep. Ralph Arza of using the word that whites may not use.

His evidence for that? He claimed that Arza used the word in a message left on his (Barreiro's) cellphone. So he just has to present the cellphone message and it's case closed -- right?

Wrong! Barreiro says he has wiped the offending message and so has only a recollection of it. And the guy is a lawmaker! But even the flimsiest accusations of racism must be taken seriously, of course. Details here

Thursday, June 29, 2006

Marine Exonerated over Song

We read:

"The US military will not punish a Marine who performed an obscenity-laced song to a laughing and cheering crowd of fellow troops in Iraq making light of killing Iraqis, the Marine Corps said today....

In the song, titled "Hadji Girl," Cpl Belile sang to fellow troops at a base in Iraq about encountering an Iraqi woman and her family. "I grabbed her little sister and put her in front of me. As the bullets began to fly, the blood sprayed from between her eyes, and then I laughed maniacally," he sang. Laughing, clapping and cheers can be heard in the background....

Another Marine Corps official, who asked not to be named because details of the inquiry are private, said poor taste, poor judgment and poor timing, not to mention offensive lyrics, do not necessarily amount to criminal conduct."

I guess he means "epithet". An epitaph is an inscription on a tomb. He can't spell "ingrained", either. And these elementary mistakes appear in a college newspaper at that! I guess that's what you get from an educational system dominated by Leftists who don't believe in standards.

I guess the article proves that if you want to be offended, you will be. The numbers were apparently randomly generated by the Idaho government computer. They obligingly withdrew the plate when they heard from the whiner.

Update

A reader notes that N166ER is registered as an aircraft tail number with the FAA. See here

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

The ACLU has recently tried to censor its board members from speaking out when they disagree with ACLU policy. That seems to be part of an accelerating drift Leftward by the ACLU.

What has got some long-term members of the ACLU particularly upset is that the ACLU is now supporting censorship of pro-life advertising:

"Mr. Kahn, a former investment company manager from Forest Hills, said what moved him to action was the ACLU's decision to endorse a bill that would regulate advertising by counseling centers operated by groups that oppose legalized abortion.

"That got me because I'm a firm believer in content-neutral defense of free speech. The fact that the ACLU would abandon that position was an earthquake," Mr. Kahn said. "The organization has lost its way."

I liked the following email from a reader in response to my recent posts about the attempted suppression of the flag of St George in England:

"This reminds me of a very similar story here in America. Shortly after I moved to Colorado in 2001, the far left lunatics and ne'er-do-wells who make up the populace of Boulder Colorado decided that the American Flag was a symbol of oppression and that is should not be flown over any municipal building. In particular, the colors were struck from flying on the pole in front of the library where the librarian was quoted as saying that the American flag was such an oppressive symbol as to be unfit for the children using the library to see.

Meanwhile throughout the library was an art exhibit which consisted of large, papier mache penises, painted with gay pride themes and suspended by wire from the ceiling. The art exhibit was fought over in court and was allowed to be erected (no pun intended) because it fell under the Freedom of Speech clause in the First Amendment, and rightly so, but when a group of veterans filed suit to have the flag raised outside, it was shot down, get this, on the same principle. The librarian was making yet another Free Speech statement by NOT flying the flag!

I'm both proud and nauseated by the outcome. I'm proud I live in a country where freedom of speech is still alive. I'm nauseated that it can be manipulated so easily by the left-wing flotsam and jetsam of society who find doing so a game. I'm proud that so many men and women put on a uniform every day to ensure these freedoms (as I have and know they do in the U.K. and Australia.) And, I'm nauseated by what the liberal rabble does with those freedoms.

In the end, sanity prevailed; well, forced sanity. The federal government stepped in and gently reminded the librarian that the Boulder Municipal Library System was the recipient of a large bundle of federal grant money annually, and that if they would like to continue to receive those funds, the flag really needs to be flying in front of the building. It is flying there today.

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Ya Gotta Laugh!

For once I actually feel sorry for President Chirac of France. He loves primitive art and has just had built a hugely expensive museum of it.

But what do you call its contents? The idea of calling the art "primitive" was judged as "demeaning" so the museum was simply named after where it is situated. Instead of being called the "Musee des artes primitif" (Forgive my fake French. I have never studied French), it is called the "Musee du Quai Branly"

Moreover:

"The historian Gilles Manceron said this week that the museum, designed around a jungle theme, still risked perpetuating colonial stereotypes"

A Florida council wants to remove one of their appointess from her job because she sent a cartoon to a friend that was judged by some as "racist":

"The controversial cartoon depicts Seminole Tribe leader Max Osceola as a drum-beating, half-naked barbarian. Next to him in a canoe sits Councilwoman Judy Paul, wearing a swimsuit and holding a big martini.

That American Indians were once drum-beating, half-naked barbarians is I suppose too much truth to handle -- and you certainly must not laugh about it!

Coulter-Hate

There are any number of examples of Coulter-hate that one could find in the writings of the Left but this one from the Puffington Host rather amused me -- for a number of reasons:

1). The author, novelist Jane Smiley, was so overpowered by her Coulter-hate that she nowhere mentions in her diatribe whom she is actually talking about. That Ann Coulter is her subject is however a safe bet.

2). Ms Smiley doesn't quote a single thing that Coulter has said. She does not argue rationally at all. It is just one long spew of hate and abuse. But that is pretty normal on the Left.

3). Ms Smiley ends up making clear that it is really Americans as a whole whom she loathes. And that is pretty normal on the Left too, of course.

A few small excerpts from the allegedly smiley one:

"Americans aren't nice or decent people, and conservative, overtly patriotic Americans are even less decent and less nice...

She looks crazy and frantic, even in the few pictures I've seen of her online. She's losing weight, as if there's some kind of underlying pathology going on, as if she's eating herself up from inside. Fear and hatred and paranoia do take their toll...

... members of the mainstream culture must be enabling her for some reason of their own, and so we get back to the first principle--Americans, true patriotic red, white, and blue Americans like hate."

Monday, June 26, 2006

Ann Coulter

Ann must be the most un-tongue-tied person there is so I know she has many fans (and also critics) here. For her fans, there is a link here that you will not want to miss -- about her recent visit to L.A.

The fact that she exaggerates and oversimplifies for humorous effect should not in my view divert attention from the underlying points she makes.

A Cartoonist Gets it Right

The Latest in the 21st Century Indian Wars

For some reason that seems to boil down to no more than a desire to upset people, the Left have a campaign going to remove references to American Indians in the names of sporting teams. Such names were once widely used to represent toughness, bravery etc.

The city of Portage in Wisconsin has long had a baseball team called the "Warriors" which used an Indian logo as an example of a warrior -- but that had to go.

Rather than change the team name, however, the team changed its logo -- to an image of an armoured knight from European history. That has however produced some derision. One good comment:

"Well, the current logo certainly has nothing to do with the local heritage of the community. I never saw a 16th century knight depicted in any of our local history books or photos. I saw American Indian warriors and pioneers. Knights? I don't think so.

Some of my ancestors were American Indian. Again, I feel the former logo depicted the local heritage respectfully, not this silly looking Knight (Tin Man) with a weapon...

My opinion is this: If the logo is tasteful, respectful and complements our heritage, what is wrong with it? The former logo was a work of art. It depicted a proud American Indian warrior chief. To look at his eyes, you can feel the pride, confidence, stern in thought and heritage. Now, all I see is a Tin Man holding a sword with a "P" on his shield. What does that have to do with our local heritage and pride? Nothing".

Sunday, June 25, 2006

"References to the beef-eating past of ancient Hindus have been deleted from Indian school textbooks after a three-year, high-pitched campaign by Hindu hard-liners....

For almost a century, history books for primary and middle schools said that in ancient India beef was considered a delicacy among Hindus -- especially among the highest caste -- and veal was offered to Hindu deities during special rituals.

The drive to cleanse the textbooks of beef references began after the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) formed a federal coalition government in 1998. The BJP stayed in power until 2004."

A British grade-school was organizing a school play to be performed by the students. There were 5 parts in it for monkeys. Three white boys and two black boys were cast as monkeys. That was described by an outraged black parent as "blatant racism".

Friday, June 23, 2006

"Father" and "Son" Wrong?

The Presbyterian Church (USA) has been big-hearted this time and said that its congregations will still refer to God and Jesus as "Father" and "Son" but it's OK if you refer to them in other ways "experimentally". "Mother" and "Daughter" soon to be heard in Presbyterian pulpits as descriptions of the Godhead?

My old church is Ann St. Presbyterian Church here in Brisbane, for which I still have great affection. It was originally a "Wee Free" church (The Free Church of Scotland) and they are still pretty fundamentalist so I think the Biblical way of referring to God and Jesus will remain all that is heard from that particular pulpit.

Christian Music not Allowed on Private Property

Another lot of modern-day Fascists who have not read the First Amendment:

"The New York Division of Human Rights threatened Len and Terry Bernardo, owners of the Skate Time 209 rink in Accord, with an investigation because the rink plays Christian music during certain hours. The agency also threatened to charge a local newspaper which advertised the event for "aiding and abetting" unlawful discrimination.

"This is crazy," said TVC Chairman Rev. Louis P. Sheldon. "These people are exercising basic Constitutional rights on private property to the exclusion of no one and the state government is treating them like dangerous criminals."

Thursday, June 22, 2006

God Censored

We read:

"A local high school graduation ended with roars of protest after school officials turned the microphone off right in the middle of one of the valedictorian's speeches. The microphone cut out after the valedictorian at Foothill High made reference to God."

"Disciplining a student for wearing a $5 T-shirt five years ago could end up costing the Warren Hills Regional School District close to $1 million. The Warren County district has been ordered to pay nearly $600,000 in plaintiffs' legal fees incurred during the 5-year-old free speech rights battle over whether a high school student could wear his "redneck" T-shirt. That tally does not include the amount the district has paid its own lawyers.

Thomas Sypniewski Jr. was suspended for three days during his senior year in 2001 for wearing a T-shirt that listed blue-collar comedian Jeff Foxworthy's Top 10 reasons someone might be considered a redneck sports fan (Reason No. 4: Your bowling team has its own fight song).....

Sypniewski's New York attorney, Gerald Walpin, said the former student never wanted more than an apology and the freedom to wear the shirt. Walpin said he went "on bended knee," begging the district not to force Sypniewski's family to have to bring a lawsuit."

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

"Curiosity and Serenity" racist?

Among rap music stars it seems to be. There is a very expensive French champagne called Cristal that comes in a very fancy bottle. It has been very popular among rap stars such as "P. Diddy" Combs, Snoop Dogg etc.

When the maker of the champagne was asked how he felt about his product being popular in such circles, he said he viewed it with "curiosity and serenity".

BAD WORDS! I have no idea why but that remark was greeted by rap star Jay-Z as racist and cause to boycott Cristal in future. Rap stars must have very fragile egos if such innocuous words bother them so much.

My guess is that the "bling" bottle Cristal comes in will continue to prove irresistable to the rap crowd.

Plug: If they wanted value for money they would be drinking Australian champagne.

Is short hair racist?

The ACLU seems to think so. A "Six Flags" theme park in Maryland wants all of its staff (black and white) to have unobtrusive haircuts so that people can concentrate on the entertainment characters portrayed rather than on the particular workers behind the characters.

Some black employees, however, like to wear large hairstyles and the ACLU thinks they should be allowed to. They say:

"This is culturally very, very insensitive and possibly discrimination" and they say that large hairstyles are "The natural style of the hair" for Africans.

Details here. Odd that blacks in South Africa normally wear their hair very short! But the ACLU is too insensitive to take a serious interest in cross-cultural differences, of course.

The Germans are not Banning THEIR Flag

Unlike the English:

"After 60 years of inhibition and embarrassment, the national colours of black, red and gold are fluttering from every windowsill and car, shrouding brothels, town halls and high-speed trains."

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

"Proselytizing" is Wrong?

"Proselytizing" sure is forbidden in Islamic countries but it seems to be banned in parts of the good old USA as well. A second-grader was banned from singing the song "Awesome God" in an after-school talent show in Frenchtown, N.J. because the song "proselytized" -- i.e. it said that a particular religion is right and tried to persuade others of that.

But what religious freedom is there if you are not allowed to argue that your religion is right? That's what Judaic religions do! Even Episcopalians say that they are right, even though it is more likely to be global warming than redemption by the blood of Christ that they are preaching.

"Turkey's public television TRT, controlled by the Islamist-rooted government, has barred the popular Walt Disney cartoon Winnie the Pooh from air because it has a piglet as one of its main heroes, the Turkish press reported today."

Monday, June 19, 2006

A friend of mine in China has just sent me an absolutely stunning email about the death of te****ist leader Zarqawi in Iraq. The "ABC" he refers to is Australia's public broadcaster:

"I noted from the ABC/BBC coverage that neither of the two ever used the word terrorism once in all the coverage related to his death. They used terms like (can you believe it?) "Al Quaeda front man", "insurgent leader", "Al Qaeda spokeman". It was like the two were reading off the same script.

On the other hand, the Middle East Specialist from the China Academy of Social Science made no bones about calling him a terrorist. On live TV! Moreover official Chinese press also referred to him as a terrorist leader in Iraq. Sad world when the Chinese Communists call a spade a spade while our own media beats about the bush in case they should offend Muslim leaders (and journalists).

Nutty NUT preaches intolerance as an aid to tolerance

Confused? You should be. Britain's National Union of Teachers (aptly abbreviated as NUT), like many teachers' unions worldwide, wants the State to be the only provider of education. Which translates to society putting all its kids into THEIR hands, of course.

"The National Union of Teachers (NUT) are calling for the abolition of faith schools over fears that segregated schooling in many parts of the country are a breeding ground for racial tensions and terrorism"

They are a bit cautious about attacking Catholic and Church of England schools but seem to think that smaller religious groups might fall prey to them if they push hard enough. One such group is the Seventh Day Adventist Church, a perfectly mainstream church in most respects except that they go to church on Saturday, believing that to be the original Sabbath.

But it so happens that the SDAs in Britain have a significant outreach to blacks so that will likely snooker the NUTs. As a black educator aptly put it in his comments on the NUTs:

"They talk about tolerance but they practice intolerance because they are saying children should only be exposed to one point of view about society and that in itself is intolerant."

"A conservative advocacy group is praising the Kentucky state school board for refusing to add the secular terms "Common Era" and "Before the Common Era" to school curriculum. The board has voted 10-0 to continue using the designations "B.C." and "A.D." to mark historical dates in textbooks and tests".

Sunday, June 18, 2006

OK to Vilify Catholics

The Australian State of Victoria has a "Equal Opportunity Commission" (EOC) that is best known for its successful prosecution of two Christian clergymen. The offense of the pastors concerned was to read out in a church seminar some of the nastier passages in the Koran. The pastors were condemned for "religious vilification".

But what happened when the Catholic Church complained to the EOC about a school text book that portrayed the history of the church in an extremely derogatory light, saying for example that The church controlled people by making them "terrified of going to hell" or face "horrific torture or being burnt alive" if they were excommunicated?

Whether or not such descriptions are accurate is not of course the point. After all, the pastors who read from the Koran presumably quoted it accurately. The point is that the textbooks clearly vilified the church and endeavoured to make it an object of hate.

But the reaction of the EOC was to dismiss the Church's complaint out of hand, saying it was "lacking in substance and misconceived".

Yet the mission of the EOC is summarized here by its head as "The Racial and Religious Tolerance Act prohibits vilification, which is the incitement of hatred, serious contempt, revulsion or severe ridicule against others on the basis of their race or religion.

I would have thought that the textbook clearly incited serious contempt, revulsion or severe ridicule against the Catholic church but the EOC obviously lives in an Alice-in-Wonderland world where words can mean anything that they want them to mean.

Saturday, June 17, 2006

Russian Prosecutors Ban Clowns' Show for Illegal Drug Propaganda

And what was the illegal drug they were promoting? You'll never guess. It was air freshener masquerading as fly spray! Don't believe me? Story here. Apparently the problem was that the fly appeared to enjoy the spray rather than being killed by it and that counted as promoting drug use.

Must not Say Homosexuality is "Deviant"

Maryland Republican activist Bob Smith has just got fired from a government job for arguing that homosexuals should not be given special favors. He might have got away with that but he mentioned the "d-word". He said:

"But that doesn't mean that government should proffer a special place of entitlement within the laws of the United States for persons of sexual deviancy."

Friday, June 16, 2006

What a Pansy!

From Australia:

"A Telstra worker traumatised by bad language in the office has won a compensation claim. The man was treated for anxiety and depression after his bosses told him to get his "arse" and "bum" on a seat, a tribunal has heard. Sivanadian Perananthasivam has been awarded medical expenses and workers' compensation for almost three months off the job because of emotional distress."

"A Hong Kong international school has apologised to the Muslim community for publishing in its yearbook a cartoon that shows the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) wearing a headdress shaped like a bomb"

Thursday, June 15, 2006

There is a press release just out which reports a new group of Leftists spewing hate at the redoubtable Ann and trying to shut her up. But the most hilarious part of their statement is this:

"Americans should rise up and denounce Ms. Coulter's flagrant attempt to profit from the deaths of innocent people on 9/11."

Since it is precisely the attempt by a group of Leftists to profit from the deaths of innocent people on 9/11 that Ms Coulter was attacking, this shows the characteristic Leftist projection (seeing your own faults in others) in full flight.

There are some good comments about Leftist attacks on Coulter and conservative women generally here. One pitiful Leftist even claims that Michael Moore looks more attractive than Ann! Yes: Read that sentence again. Hate sure has tremendous power to distort perceptions.

Amazing Fuss

It's hard to believe but the above slightly clever advertisement for cruise ship holidays has aroused great wrath, even in laid-back Australia.

"Women's Health NSW executive officer, Denele Crozier, said the postcards "encouraged [men] to treat women like a piece of meat." NSW Rape Crisis Centre manager Karen Willis described them as "misogynistic" and "sexist in the extreme". "What they do is create a culture where at the extreme end some people may think that violence against women is somehow condoned," Ms Willis said.

The protesters would seem to have vivid imaginations. The cruise-ship company has of course grovelled in response.

The Incredible Poles

There are a lot of people from Poland in Australia and in general I think highly of them. But they seem to be uniformly crazy when it comes to antisemitism. It seems to go back to the time when Poland had a large Jewish population -- one which Hitler wiped out with a lot of enthusiastic help from Poles. The fact that there were a lot of Jews in Poland and the fact that the Jews were generally much more prosperous than the generally very poor Poles led to a common belief in prewar Poland that Jews ran the country and were using their dominance to grab all the wealth for themselves.

And the fact that there are now only a handful of Jews left in Poland seems to have changed attitudes not at all. Even non-existent Jews remain a hate-object in Poland. So we read here of the latest round of antisemitic incidents.

The Polish authorities have in response arrested the proprietor of an antisemitic website but they are essentially pissing into the wind. If the wiping out of the Jewish population has not altered beliefs about Jewish exploitation of Poland, one more or less website is not going to alter anything.

And censoring any speech just gives it an air of importance and truth that it would not otherwise have. And after Poland's experience of Communist censorship, censoring something must seem like a GUARANTEE of its truth.

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

A Rare Win

We read:

"A Sacramento federal judge on Monday tossed out atheist Michael Newdow's challenge to the phrase "In God We Trust" as the national motto and its inscription on coins and currency. Newdow argued that the slogan violates the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution, which keeps government out of religion."

The ruling was however based on the rather bizarre claim that the motto is not religious!

Here's a Whole List of Expressions that you are not Allowed to Use

Pennsylvania magistrate Wade Brown is on trial over his wicked language. He apparently used both racist and sexist language. We are not told what the racist expressions were but here are the sexist ones. He described various female employees as:

"PMS," "senile," "that time of the month," "dumb blonde," "stupid" and "gold digger."

Watch out that you never use such awful expressions in describing anybody! As a wise woman once said to me: "No woman likes to be told she is pre-menstrual -- particularly when she is". More here.

Must Not Describe Email System as "Crap"

At least not to the sensitive ears of English local council employees. Taff Davies, a former Navy captain and software entrepreneur, got elected to Chichester District Council but was removed from the office to which he was democratically elected because he did not pussyfoot around in his comments about the council computer system -- a system that they had just spent millions on.

As a software entrepreneur, he was presumably in a position to know what he was talking about but he forgot that in a bureaucracy the no. 1 objective is not efficiency. It is not rocking the boat. Details here and here

And the feminist shrews responsible for this gross piece of anti-business law think it's too bad if the employer is in no position to know what is going on:

"Today's world makes it harder for employers to guard against sexual harassment because it could be conducted below their radar. You can't always tell what people are sending on their computers," Ms Watson said.

An African Speaks the Unspeakable

"Sorious Samura says he did it because he could. The television journalist's documentary, Living with Aids, broke an almighty taboo by scrutinising male sexual promiscuity as a cause of Africa's HIV epidemic...

'The things I said in Living with Aids about the African male's sexuality are things that no white journalist can say,' he muses...

In Living with Aids, broadcast last year, Samura confronted Zambian men who said they could see no point in wearing a condom once they had HIV. In an interview with The Observer at the time, Samura described a culture of sexual recklessness internalised in childhood and cited his own experience growing up in Sierra Leone, where he became sexually active at the age of seven and had unprotected intercourse with multiple partners".

The English landlady of a Welsh pub wanted to organize a game where patrons shot arrows at a target in the form of a dragon. But the only big picture of a dragon she could find was the one on the official flag of Wales -- so she used that. Big mistake. The Welsh police investigated the matter and called it a "hate crime". Whether a prosecution will result remains to be seen. More here

Monday, June 12, 2006

Weather "Girl" Incorrect

Two Canadian politicians are fighting over whether it is "sexist" to refer to weather "girls". I know quite a lot of old ladies who refer to one another as "girls", so I would have thought it was a complimentary term. But on planet Canada, you never know. Details here

A "Right" to do Business in Spanish in the USA?

I guess most readers have heard of this by now but for those who have not: Some Hispanic groups seem to think that they have got a right to walk into any U.S. shop and transact their purchase while speaking Spanish only.

A famous Philadelphia cheesesteak (I've never had one but they sound yummy) house has adopted a policy of taking orders in English only. Why should its staff be compelled to learn Spanish in a country where the Senate has declared English to be the official language?

But that's not good enough, apparently:

"Juntos, a Hispanic neighborhood organization, said it plans to send people to Geno's to try to order in Spanish and may pursue court action, depending on what happens."

On May 11th I mentioned the case of Christian businessman Tim Bono who refused to duplicate Lesbian propaganda for a customer.

The lesbian customer then lodged a complaint about that with the Arlington County Human Rights Commission, who ruled in her favour.

But Bono is not a quitter. With assistance from conservative lawyers, he has filed an appeal with the Arlington Circuit Court. He appears to have such a strong case legally that the ruling against him by the Arlington County Human Rights Commission gives the impression that it is little more than a kangaroo court. Details here

Fun!

From California:

"A suburban City Council wants to limit public comment during its meetings after a pastor said he was placing a curse on the city manager and his family."

"I think if she's worried about people being mean to women she should have a talk with her husband."

She knows how to answer abuse with abuse but her abuse is factually based. Bill Clinton was indeed a cur in the way he treated many women.

Leftist Logic

I have recently posted here a short discussion of the characteristic Leftist inability to argue logically. I thought therefore that I might point out a choice example of that in the Comments on this blog.

In my top post of 10th., I noted that there would logically have to be lots of Democrat voters who died on 9/11. I said: "MANY of those who died would, on average, have been Democrat voters." I didn't say ALL, I didn't say MOST, just MANY. Most of the workers in the twin towers would have been support staff (clerks etc.) rather than investment bankers etc so it could hardly have been otherwise considering the roughly 50/50 split in the USA betweeen the supporters of the two major parties.

Our Leftist commenter could not argue with that, of course, so he/she invented something I did NOT say and argued with that! He/she portrayed me as saying that "The World Trade Center was full of pinko commie investment bankers". Classic Leftist illogic and misrepresentation! Not a shred of honesty or attempt to engage in real debate in it.

Another Nutty Attack on Displaying the English Flag

Just when you think that global warming alarmism cannot get any more inane, along comes another story which shows that there is a bottomless well of stupid:

"Drivers showing their support for England with window flags during the World Cup will pay more in fuel costs, an academic has claimed. An average car with two flags attached burns an extra litre of fuel per hour at an average of 70 mph, said Manchester University's Dr Antonio Filippone. He also calculated that 500,000 drivers all doing the same will create 2.8 million kg of carbon dioxide emissions. The extra fuel consumption is caused by the flags creating drag".

"Christchurch physician Sue Bagshaw said last Monday's 60 Minutes current affairs show cut a large chunk of her interview when she said Maori culture was a major reason for New Zealand's high teenage pregnancy rates."

The TV show later tried to weasel out of it but admitted that the Maori rate was way higher than the rate among whites.

Only Whites Can be Guilty of Hate Speech

How many years in jail would a white Canadian get for saying this:

"[He] blamed Jews for the Second World War during a profanity-filled speech. [He] repeated those sentiments when approached afterward by a reporter from the Saskatoon StarPhoenix. He went on to laud Hitler's use of death camps as a way to "clean up the world" of Jewish people.

I don't think there is any doubt that the penalty would be heavy. But the speaker was a Canadian Indian so his speech was judged to be "spontaneous" and hence not deserving of any penalty. I wonder if whites can be "spontaneous" too. I look forward to it being used as a defence in some future case.

Saturday, June 10, 2006

Call for Political Censorship

When the 9/11 tragedy occurred, many of those who died would, on average, have been Democrat voters. And it is reasonable that some may have been far-Leftists. And that some far-Leftists would be married to other far Leftists is equally reasonable.

So finding a handful of far-Left widows among all the 9/11 widows is unsurprising. And far-Leftists, of course, blame George Bush for 9/11. And there is in fact a group of far-Left widows who go about doing that. And the fact that they are 9/11 widows makes people reluctant to criticize them. The women take advantage of people's kindness in order to push their far-Left barrow and not be criticized for it.

But Ann Coulter is fearless and subjects them to the same scorching criticism that she would apply to anyone else on the Left. She has in fact written a book that criticizes the widows concerned. So what is the Leftist response to that?

Censorship, of course. They want to ban her book and they attack those who sell it. A couple of examples of that here and here. Taranto has some good comments about the matter too.

All of which does I think tend to show that it is conservatives who are the tolerant ones. I have never heard of conservatives calling for bans on the fruitcake stories about 9/11 ("It was a CIA plot"; "The Jews did it" etc.) but just criticizing some of those who propagate such ideas is seen by the Left as cause for censorship.

Update

For those who are interested, you can get a copy of Ann Coulter's book for $4.99 here

Is the "N-word" Losing its Punch?

We read of a black student in suburban New York who found frequent use of the word among young whites as well as blacks:

"At first, the 17-year-old got into fights over their use of the word "nigger." But then he said he came to the sad realization that hip-hop culture had made it popular if not acceptable for nearly anyone to use the epithet - or variations of it - in a seemingly harmless way.

"Fan William Hodgson has been ordered to take down his England flags because they make a condemned street look untidy. Housing chiefs told William, 50, the St George banners "bring down" the area, even though most houses are empty and are soon to be demolished."

Friday, June 09, 2006

AD or CE?

The usual way of describing dates uses the abbreviations AD or BC to indicate where they fall on either side of the presumed birth of Christ. Some Jews and Muslims of course use dating systems based on their own significant events.

The religion-haters get their underwear all bunched up over the AD/BC terminology, however -- ignoring that it is simply a standard practice used by people of many belief systems to avoid confusion.

In April, the Kentucky State board of education decided that their schools would teach a common alternative to the AD/BC notation -- a system that uses CE and BCE. That got a lot of opposition last week, however:

"The attendees of a public hearing today regarding a recommendation to change the designation of time were overwhelmingly against the measure."

Parents are again being forbidden from photographing their own children -- this time in Australia:

"The Coffs Harbour Eisteddfod has prohibited parents from taking photographs and videos of their children. The ban was sparked when a father at last year's event inadvertently videotaped children who were subject to child custody orders preventing them from being photographed.

Organisers also were concerned images of the children could be used by pedophiles.

Good to see that the State government has criticized the ban. For a previous British case, see here

English Patriotism Overwhelms the Killjoys

The politically correct brigade have been doing all they can to stop English people displaying their flag -- as noted previously on this blog. But the ordinary people of England are not having it:

"From Downing Street to the bleakest housing estate, from David Cameron's bike to the dirtiest white van, the flag of St George is fluttering optimistically once again. World Cup fever has arrived, and anything with the red cross of England on it is selling fast....

Flag manufacturers said yesterday that demand was double that of four years ago in the build-up to the last tournament...

Even the Prime Minister has adopted it. Mr Blair's spokesman confirmed yesterday: "We will fly the flag on match days due to the special nature of the occasion.

Thursday, June 08, 2006

Taranto and Bias Against Whites

A couple of commenters here have noted that one of my posts elsewhere was referred to in the "Opinion Journal" section of the WSJ written by Taranto. Here is a link about it for those who are interested.

Must not Use "Ooga Booga"

Do you know what "ooga booga" means? I don't. But its meaning apparently becomes a lot clearer if it assists a "refugee" to stay in Australia after a tribunal has ruled that she is not a refugee.

A tribunal member wrote "ooga booga" on a document connected to the case and that was judged to make the tribunal's ruling invalid. Details here

In Australia, "Ooga Booga" is actually the brand-name for a line of fashionable clothing so one might have thought that the term had good vibes. But the court concerned obviously vibrated differently.

Conservative Bike Riders

Recent news censorship by Google has now got a lot of attention in the media (e.g. here). The report below is a bit amusing, though.

"Three right-leaning US news websites have been delisted from Google News for pedalling "hate speech".

Uttering hate speech while riding a bicycle sounds unlikely so the writer presumably mean "peddling", a pedlar being an itinerant salesman. Journalism is not what it used to be. Amusing that the site concerned bills itself as "The essential site for journalists"!

One of the conservative news sites delisted by Google is now hitting back. They have put up here a list of alternative search engines to Google. I was surprised to see how many there are. Worth bookmarking. Getting people to use other search engines is the obvious way to make Google rethink.

The Unmentionable Wing

From a BBC report about the illegal immigration issue in the USA:

"The issue has polarised politics and US society. Right-wing groups have protested against illegal immigrants, while millions of people marched in support of them last month".

Only one side of the issue has a "wing" supporting it, apparently. That the marchers were supported and organized by very Left-wing groups is unmentionable. Pro-illegal demonstrators are just "people" -- quite wingless.

"A school has changed the names of its primary one classes after complaints that they left some children feeling inferior, BBC Scotland has learned. Bonnyrigg Primary School had called its classes 1a and 1b but some parents of children in 1b said it left the youngsters feeling second best. The classes will now be known as 1ar and 1ap, incorporating teachers' surnames in the new titles."

Tuesday, June 06, 2006

Conservatives Hit Back

Conservatives and Christians are so often attacked over their beliefs that I rather enjoy seeing them occasionally striking back. And using the legal tools of their foes against the foes concerned seems fair play to me.

So when a school took its students to see the "Da Vinci Code" movie in school time, it seems fair to say that the school was sponsoring an anti-Christian movie (certainly an anti-Catholic one) and that such sponsorship violated the separation of church and state.

One group of Christian parents in Michigan said just that and registered a protest over it.

There should be more of it. If the Left get the invented "separation" doctrine used against them enough, they might actually come to oppose it!

The Decayed English

I am doing a roundup of recent and not so recent flag reports today, inspired by the latest news from England:

"Following warnings by extremist Islamic group al-Muhajiroun, in which the group said that the red cross in the England flag symbolizes the 'blood thirsty crusaders' and the occupation of Muslims, some of the largest companies in England have ordered their workers not to wave the flags".

"Several students at Shaw Heights Middle School have been disciplined for wearing shirts that depict the American flag, an act that is in direct violation of the public school's recent ban on all flags, depictions of flags, or flag colors on student clothing....

All of the students who were suspended said they had a connection to the military -- either they have a family member now serving or someone in the family had once served. They said despite the school ban, and even if it means another suspension, they will continue to wear their shirts.

Hard to imagine what he could reasonably be charged with as long as the flag concerned was his own property.

No Arrests in Mexico

A U.S. and a Mexican team played a soccer game last year which the Mexico team won. We read of the event:

"There was some booing and whistling during "The Star-Spangled Banner," but the Americans expected worse. After the game, about 100 people gathered for a peaceful celebration near Mexico City's Angel of Independence monument. A few first tried to burn, then trampled a small American flag while chanting "Osama! Osama!"

Monday, June 05, 2006

We get Results

(With a lot of help from others)

We read:

"An outpouring of criticism forced Seattle Public Schools on Thursday to pull a Web site that viewed planning for the future, emphasizing individualism and defining standard English as examples of cultural racism."

"A group seeking to create a new specialty license plate to raise money for pregnancy centers that urge women not to have abortions has filed a lawsuit arguing that lawmakers played favorites when approving such plates.

Supporters of the license plate, which would read "Choose Life," allege lawmakers violated their free speech, due process and equal protection rights by twice rejecting their application for the specialty plate while approving other proposals..."

"Victorian schools are being advised to dump the words "mother" and "father" by a controversial new teachers manual that promotes the cause of same-sex parents. Out of sensitivity to same-sex parent families, teachers should use "parent" or "carer" instead, the manual states.

Schools should also put up posters of gay celebrities in schools and not use gender-specific toys, the free Learn to Include teacher's manual urges."

Evangelist Ray Comfort circulates a Christian tract in the general form of a Greenback -- though one that shows a value of one million dollars and one that has lots of other differences from a real Greenback. Anybody dumb enough to mistake it for real U.S. currency would of course be rapidly disillusioned.

But the U.S. Secret Service are apparently super-dumb. They have managed to lever their fat behinds out of their chairs for long enough to give an impression of doing something useful: They have seized Pastor Comfort's tracts.

Pastor Comfort's lawyer comments:

"If the Secret Service does not cease from this intrusion upon the free speech rights and free exercise rights of Ray Comfort and others, that agency will be explaining its outrageous conduct to a federal judge."

The whole thing is obviously just some nasty little anti-Christian bureaucrat looking for an excuse to exercise his prejudices. If they left Pastor Comfort's tracts alone and seized some illegal immigrants instead, they might be worth feeding.

Update:

Note that I have updated the link above. "Source" now leads to the WND article.

Update 2

My comments above about the SS were not of course directed at the brave young SS men who go out on security detail protecting the President. My comments were directed at the bureaucracy behind them and the U.S. "security" bureaucracy generally.

Sunday, June 04, 2006

Theological Statement a Breach of "Human Rights"

In 2004 a Canadian university professor said on his personal website that if Canadian Anglicans persisted in condoning homosexuality, they would be a schismatic church -- i.e. no longer part of the worldwide Anglican communion. As the Archbishop of Canterbury has subsequently "disinvited" the north American Anglicans from future Lambeth conferences, this would seem to be both theologically accurate and good prophecy.

A Canadian homosexual has now however claimed that the professor's statement violates his "human rights" and made him cry. So he is asking that the professor be disciplined for making the statement. He is headed to court with the intention of achieving that and the university concerned is "investigating" the professor. Details here and here.

Censoring the Past

We read:

"Football fans trooping into the Olympic Stadium in Berlin will be confronted with some of the most powerful ghosts of the Nazi era: broad-shouldered statues sculpted at the behest of Adolf Hitler to celebrate the Aryan master race.

Now leading Jewish activists are calling for the bronze statues to be draped in canvas or removed entirely to shield fans from what they regard as Nazi propaganda".

I sympathize with how these Jewish protestors must feel but I think they are rowing in the wrong direction entirely. I think that people need to be REMINDED of the past. And covering up the statues would surely be a proclamation that they still have an important and potent message. Does anybody really want to proclaim that?

Student barred from counter-protesting illegals

We read:

"A California student has filed a federal lawsuit claiming high school officials intentionally interfered with his right to speak out on the issue of illegal immigration.

Joshua Denhalter of Jurupa Valley High School in Mira Loma, Calif., alleges he was barred from holding a counter-protest after students March 27, mostly of Mexican-American descent, illegally walked out of school in protest of legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives that would make being in the country illegally a felony.

Denhalter, represented by the public interest firm Lively, Ackerman & Cowles, says that instead of walking out and being truant, he chose to organize a legitimate and lawful counter-protest during the lunch hour March 30."

Saturday, June 03, 2006

More School Stupidity about MySpace

We read:

"A student who clearly has some other issues to deal with posted a MySpace group designed specifically around his hatred for a particular girl. It was definitely over-the-top, and the student was suspended and the school is trying to expel him. However, the school ALSO suspended 20 students who just looked at the page."

In the lead-up to the imminent Word Cup soccer match, lots of English soccer fans want to display the St George flag to show their support for their national team. They are getting a lot of opposition to it, however, with frequent claims that flying the national flag is "racist"!

The latest episode has an odd twist, however. The private firm that does maintenance work for Salford council has barred its employess from displaying the flag while at work. People directly employed by the council itself, however ARE allowed to display the flag! Details here

An Online Book Recommendation

A reader writes:

"I read TongueTied.us and your blogs almost daily to see what craziness is going on in the world. Even after reading these issues for so long, it still does not surprise me the extent to which "Newspeak" is being adopted. (ref the most recent addition on tonguetied where the world "victim" was unacceptible on a head stone.)

To that end, I was wondering if you would accept a suggestion. With all of the "Newspeak" being added to and subtracted from the lexicon of English, would you add a link to George Orwell's "1984" to one of your posts? Reading this book will give your readers a nice perspective to how far all of this can go. I will bet most of your readers have never actually read the book, even though I am sure they have heard about it.

I recently decided to read it again. The story is a excellent warning to the world of what may be if we continue to follow the path we are on. I am amazed at how Orwell renders the "absolute ends" through which a communist state could exist. The book is online here".

Friday, June 02, 2006

"Victim" Incorrect

Mentioning something as nasty as "victims" is now apparently a no-no. Apparently the word "victim" is so upsetting that you cannot even have it on a headstone in a cemetary! A New York Jewish family wanted to put on a memorial headstone for one of their seniors that he was a "victim" of the Holocaust but the cemetary management just would not allow that word.

Finally a compromise was reached: The deceased could be said to have "perished" in the Holocaust. I guess "perish" will not be allowed either, eventually. Perhaps "ceased to live" will one day become all that's permissible. Details here

Studied Silence about Racial Discrimination

If a black had been demoted from a job on the basis of his race, we would never hear the end of it. But what have we heard about the case of Dr Ellen Cauthen? I have tried three search engines to find out but have drawn an almost complete blank. All I can find is this article -- which tells me that a Federal court "found that Dr. Cauthen, a former school administrator, who is white, was transferred illegally based on her race." No further details are given other than the fact that the court awarded her $258,000 damages

The article includes a picture of Superintendent Charles Larke so it would seem that he was central to the injustice. It would appear from another article that Dr Larke, who is black, has a "loose shoes" problem but it seems a considerable pity that all we can do is speculate.

Boy Scouts have a Win

In a dispute going back to 1998!

An atheist father, John Scalise, wanted the courts to bar the Boy Scouts from schools -- based on the usual inflated interpretation of the First Amendment ban on establishing religion. He lost in the Michigan courts and now SCOTUS has refused his appeal. Details here

Thursday, June 01, 2006

But Will it Sell?

We read:

"Comic book heroine Batwoman is to make a comeback as a "lipstick lesbian" who moonlights as a crime fighter, a DC Comics spokesman has confirmed. ...

The new-look Batwoman is just one of a wave of ethnically and sexually diverse characters entering the DC Comics universe. Others include Mexican teenager Blue Beetle - who replaces the character's previous white incarnation....

Regular characters Firestorm and The Atom, meanwhile, have been reinvented as black and Asian heroes respectively."

The High Court of Australia recently ruled that the "n-word" is not offensive in Australia -- so, as an Australian, my view of the offensiveness of the word could well lack authority.

But any claim by the Rev. Al Sharpton to be an authority on anything is in my view a fairly dubious claim too. Nonetheles, we do read here his claim to be a forensic authority on use of the N-word.

It would be an incautious court that would treat Shakedown Sharpton as the authority he claims to be. But he may get his wish for all that. A black skin seems to be an almost ironclad guarantee of righteousness in the public deliberations of the USA today.

His claim that the word is ALWAYS offensive is however more than a little strange in view of the frequency with which blacks themselves use it to and about one-another.

Incorrect Erections

From Batty Britain:

"A resident's e-mails objecting to a planning application were blocked by a computer system that tries to filter blue or risque language. Commercial lawyer Ray Kennedy, from Middleton, Gtr Manchester, wrote three e-mails to Rochdale Council complaining about a planning matter. But two messages, with the word "erection", were blocked as offensive and the third was too late..."

Is the American national anthem politically incorrect? From the 4th verse:Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."

Mohammad

"HATE SPEECH" is free speech: The U.S. Supreme Court stated the general rule regarding protected speech in Texas v. Johnson (109 S.Ct. at 2544), when it held: "The government may not prohibit the verbal or nonverbal expression of an idea merely because society finds the idea offensive or disagreeable." Federal courts have consistently followed this. Said Virginia federal district judge Claude Hilton: "The First Amendment does not recognize exceptions for bigotry, racism, and religious intolerance or ideas or matters some may deem trivial, vulgar or profane."

Even some advocacy of violence is protected by the 1st Amendment. In Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969), the U.S. Supreme Court held unanimously that speech advocating violent illegal actions to bring about social change is protected by the First Amendment "except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action."

The double standard: Atheists can put up signs and billboards saying that Christianity is wrong and that is hunky dory. But if a Christian says that homosexuality is wrong, that is attacked as "hate speech"

One for the militant atheists to consider: "...it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg" -- Thomas Jefferson

"I think no subject should be off-limits, and I regard the laws in many Continental countries criminalizing Holocaust denial as philosophically repugnant and practically useless – in that they confirm to Jew-haters that the Jews control everything (otherwise why aren’t we allowed to talk about it?)" -- Mark Steyn

Voltaire's most famous saying was actually a summary of Voltaire's thinking by one of his biographers rather than something Voltaire said himself. Nonetheless it is a wholly admirable sentiment: "I disagree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it". I am of a similar mind.

The traditional advice about derogatory speech: "Sticks and stones will break your bones but names will never hurt you". Apparently people today are not as emotionally robust as their ancestors were.

The KKK were members of the DEMOCRATIC party. Google "Klanbake" if you doubt it

A phobia is an irrational fear, so the terms "Islamophobic" and "homophobic" embody a claim that the people so described are mentally ill. There is no evidence for either claim. Both terms are simply abuse masquerading as diagnoses and suggest that the person using them is engaged in propaganda rather than in any form of rational or objective discourse.

Leftists often pretend that any mention of race is "racist" -- unless they mention it, of course. But leaving such irrational propaganda aside, which statements really are racist? Can statements of fact about race be "racist"? Such statements are simply either true or false. The most sweeping possible definition of racism is that a racist statement is a statement that includes a negative value judgment of some race. Absent that, a statement is not racist, for all that Leftists might howl that it is. Facts cannot be racist so nor is the simple statement of them racist. Here is a statement that cannot therefore be racist by itself, though it could be false: "Blacks are on average much less intelligent than whites". If it is false and someone utters it, he could simply be mistaken or misinformed.

Categorization is a basic human survival skill so racism as the Left define it (i.e. any awareness of race) is in fact neither right nor wrong. It is simply human

Whatever your definition of racism, however, a statement that simply mentions race is not thereby racist -- though one would think otherwise from American Presidential election campaigns. Is a statement that mentions dogs, "doggist" or a statement that mentions cats, "cattist"?

If any mention of racial differences is racist then all Leftists are racist too -- as "affirmative action" is an explicit reference to racial differences

Was Abraham Lincoln a racist? "You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other two races. Whether it is right or wrong I need not discuss, but this physical difference is a great disadvantage to us both, as I think your race suffer very greatly, many of them by living among us, while ours suffer from your presence. In a word, we suffer on each side. If this be admitted, it affords a reason at least why we should be separated. It is better for both, therefore, to be separated." -- Spoken at the White House to a group of black community leaders, August 14th, 1862

Gimlet-eyed Leftist haters sometimes pounce on the word "white" as racist. Will the time come when we have to refer to the White House as the "Full spectrum of light" House?

The spirit of liberty is "the spirit which is not too sure that it is right." and "Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there it needs no constitution, no law, no court to save it." -- Judge Learned Hand

Mostly, a gaffe is just truth slipping out

Two lines below of a famous hymn that would be incomprehensible to Leftists today ("honor"? "right"? "freedom?" Freedom to agree with them is the only freedom they believe in)

First to fight for right and freedom,
And to keep our honor clean

It is of course the hymn of the USMC -- still today the relentless warriors that they always were.

It seems a pity that the wisdom of the ancient Greek philosopher Epictetus is now little known. Remember, wrote the Stoic thinker, "that foul words or blows in themselves are no outrage, but your judgment that they are so. So when any one makes you angry, know that it is your own thought that has angered you. Wherefore make it your endeavour not to let your impressions carry you away."

"Since therefore the knowledge and survey of vice is in this world so necessary to the constituting of human virtue, and the scanning of error to the confirmation of truth, how can we more safely, and with less danger, scout into the regions of sin and falsity than by reading all manner of tractates, and hearing all manner of reason?" -- English poet John Milton (1608-1674) in Areopagitica

Leftists can try to get you fired from your job over something that you said and that's not an attack on free speech. But if you just criticize something that they say, then that IS an attack on free speech

The intellectual Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius (AD 121-180) could have been speaking of much that goes on today when he said: "The object in life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane."

I despair of the ADL. Jews have enough problems already and yet in the ADL one has a prominent Jewish organization that does its best to make itself offensive to Christians. Their Leftism is more important to them than the welfare of Jewry -- which is the exact opposite of what they ostensibly stand for! Jewish cleverness seems to vanish when politics are involved. Fortunately, Christians are true to their saviour and have loving hearts. Jewish dissatisfaction with the myopia of the ADL is outlined here. Note that Foxy was too grand to reply to it.

NOTE: The archives provided by blogspot below are rather inconvenient. They break each month up into small bits. If you want to scan whole months at a time, the backup archives will suit better. See here or here